Do you run to God when you’re tempted to sin? Or do you run away? The quick, 10-minute video below shows you how to connect with Jesus’s love for you so that you can beat whatever temptation you face.
Bonus: Click the link in the box below the video to get the free PDF so that you can print (or screenshot) all of the good stuff from the video!
Want the PDF shown in the video? It’s in our Freebie Library!
As God’s children, we’re sometimes insecure. We grow and change. Like Adam and Eve, we crave God’s glory. Like them, we’re tempted to fill this desire in other ways.
Here’s what we can learn from their story: God has only one way for us to fill our desire for him. That’s knowing him. This relationship with him matters more than any other desire that we feel. If we operate outside of his love, we end up outside of our territory.
DON’T FALL FOR THE STRESS TRAP
It’s easy to give up when weariness takes over, but God has a better plan. You don’t have to give in to the enemy’s tactics.
The key to beating temptation is to know that your deepest desire is to experience God’s love. When you notice that you’re being tempted toward wrongness, you can remind yourself that God’s love is better than whatever you’re craving.
Then, you have to actually experience that love. If not, you’ll just follow your craving. (Or, you’ll remind yourself that following your craving is dangerous, and you’ll live without God’s love, always fighting that unfulfilled craving.)
How do you get God’s love when you’re craving something else?
You ask him for his love. Then, you feel it. (Remember when he saved you?) It doesn’t have to feel a certain way. Just let it sink in. Other cravings fade away.
Try This Yourself
Think about something you really crave when you’re tempted to sin. Now, realize that God knows you crave it. He’s either going to take away the craving or fill it his way. Why? Because he loves you! In this moment, you are with him and that other desire doesn’t matter.
The diagram below shows you how to handle these cravings when they keep coming back. The key is to get used to asking God for his love and then taking it.
This diagram shows how darts of temptation flow inward from the bodily, physical realm that we can see, hear, touch, smell and taste. Our will allows our mind to imagine fulfilling that temptation. Then, we remember what it feels like emotionally. This leads to spiritual bondage (fulfilling the craving, or resisting it with self-rightness).
Or, it can trigger us to ask God for spiritual freedom.
Like the Hebrew slaves crossed the Red Sea to freedom, we were saved by the “washing of regeneration” in Christ’s blood. Where the Lord lives in our spirit, there is liberty to control our own body (flesh) and soul (emotions, mind and will). God’s love (pictured as the rod) flows the opposite direction of Satan’s darts of temptation in our lives.
From the Bible:
• Example of the Hebrew slaves for us- 1 Co 10:1-15
• Washing of regeneration- Tit 3:5
• Our spiritual liberty- 2 Cor 3:17
• Our spirit, soul & body- 1 Thes 5:23
• Rod & parting of the sea- Ex 14:16, 21
• Snake turns into a rod- Ex 4:3-4
• Darts of Satan- Eph 6:16
We can use The Security Strategy to break through the devil’s influence when a bad feeling, thought or choice comes along to tempt us. First, we notice that this desire is threatening to steal our freedom. Instead of giving in, we can open our heart to Christ who is living in us. His spiritual energy of love will now begin flowing from our spirit through our soul and into our physical actions. This is how we can make the mature choice when a mistake threatens our worship. (See an overview in the bolds below.)
Step-By-Step Directions:
- The moment you were saved, the spirit of Jesus moved into your spirit and lives there because his Ghost was “shed on [you] abundantly” (once and for all, Tit 3:6).
- Oh no! Your soul is influenced (tempted) with either [1] a sin, or [2] a desire to do the right thing in order to be better than other people (I’m-rightness).
- Now, you notice that you are being influenced in your feelings, mind and will to sin.
- Your intellect (the part of you that controls your thoughts) asks Jesus Christ to use his rod (his love for you) to split the situation and make a way for you to escape it.
- Instantly, you are spiritually energized to move away from the temptation (enemy).
- (See “The Security Diagram” below.) Power flows from your spirit into your emotions. Your memory recognizes this feeling of power and prompts your intellect to imagine yourself using it. Your will connects this power to your body. You’re now free to do the right thing for the right reason.
- You realize that you just defeated an overwhelming temptation with God’s power! You admire this new freedom and tell God he’s amazing. Then, you ask him to help you out of this temptation again, whenever it happens next.
(Get these seven steps with the diagram below as a FREE PDF! Just see the instructions in the tan box at the top of this post to download.)
To use this strategy when you’re tempted, print the PDF and keep it nearby the place where you usually experience your main temptation. Or, take a screenshot of the seven steps and diagram above, and keep them handy on your phone.
In the PDF, you also get the bonus pages with 30 Battlegrounds. This will help you pinpoint exactly where the enemy is attacking you on a daily basis.
To download the PDF, see the tan box at the top of this post.
For the next post in our “What to Do When You’re…” series, click HERE.
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